Jersey Summer Fruit and Vegetable Relish:

Fruits and vegetables are plentiful and delicious in New Jersey during the summer. Peaches, tomatoes, and corn are all prominently featured at the farmer’s markets right now and if you give it another week or so, I think everything will be at its peak of flavor.

This relish can be used as a relish for grilled meats and seafood. It can be used as an ingredient in a salad of summer greens or simply as a side dish. It can also be transformed into a great salsa for summertime snacking by adding some cilantro and a hot fresh pepper. It can be stored in an airtight container for about a week or so.

As a bonus, this dish packs a variety of vegetables and is sweetened by the peaches. So hopefully kids will enjoy it as well. If they need a bit more coaxing, a tablespoon of honey at the very end might do the trick. However, I think the citrus, peaches, etc. will help to please the entire family.  Recipe follows after the jump.  Enjoy!

Prep Time: 15 minutes

Cook Time: 15 minutes

Total Time: 30 minutes

Ingredients:

2 ears Jersey corn- husked and silks removed

2 Jersey tomatoes- seeded and chopped

1 Jersey sweet yellow onion- chopped

2 Jersey Peaches- halved with center seed removed

1 garlic clove- minced

3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

Juice of one lemon, lime, or orange

1 tablespoon vinegar (I’d use sherry vinegar but any clear colored vinegar will work)

Salt and freshly ground pepper

Optional: Chopped herbs like parsley, cilantro, or thyme

Instructions:

Prepare all fruits and vegetables for cooking by gathering all ingredients.

Take the corn and remove husks and silks. Take the ear of corn and place it on a cutting board standing up tall. Take a knife and slowly move the blade from the top of the corn to the bottom towards the cutting board, cutting away the individual kernels in strips. Continue until all the kernels are removed. Go slowly here as you want to be careful of your knife motion.

Once the kernels are removed, take the knife, turn it around so that you can work with the back of the blade (the non-sharp side). Move the back of the knife up the corn ear towards the top of the corn. As you do, you will scrape up milky bits of corn liquid and corn remnants. Set milky corn aside separately.

Cut the two peaches in half and remove the seed. Salt and pepper the flat cut side.

Chop and seed the tomatoes. To ensure you don’t get many seeds, simply cut the four sides of the tomatoes and the bottom. You should be left with a cube of the inside of the tomato that contains the seeds and much of the juice. You can either discard that portion or reserve it for another use in a different dish. Once you have the four sides and bottom of the tomato, chop into a ¼ inch dice (or as close as you can get so that the tomato pieces and the corn kernels are approximately similar sizes).

Cut the onion finely. Reserve 2 tablespoons of the fresh onion from the rest for a later use.

Mince the garlic clove

If using herbs, chop and set aside

Combine the citrus juice with the vinegar and set aside.

Once the vegetables and peaches are ready:

Heat a skillet over medium heat for three full minutes to heat the pan.

Place one tablespoon of the olive oil in the pan and add the peaches, cut side down (so it is flaying flat in the pan). Cook around two minutes until the peach has browned a bit and has started to cook (but isn’t cooked through…you want the peaches to remain largely fresh). Remove the peaches and place on a plate.

Add the corn to the pan. Add a little olive oil to the pan if necessary. Add salt and a bit of pepper and cook for several minutes until the corn begins to brown. (Note: you still have reserved the milky corn bits and have not used them at this point).

Add the onion (remembering to reserve two tablespoons of the onion for later use). Cook the onion in with the corn until translucent and slightly browned.

Reduce heat to low and add garlic. Cook for another minute and remove from heat.

Place the corn and onion mixture in a bowl. Add the chopped tomatoes. Add the reserved milky corn mixture and the reserved raw onion to the bowl. Add the chopped herbs if using.

Chop up the peach trying to get as close to a ¼ inch dice as you can. If the peach starts to fall apart as you are finely dicing it, simply stop and coarsely chop it so that it retains as much of its shape as it can. Add diced peaches to the vegetable mix.